OxfordPress.com

Pressure mounts to solve illegal immigration mess

It's no surprise to see Republican senators John McCain and Jon Kyl from heavily Latino Arizona weighing in on the controversial issue of immigration reform with competing legislation.

But when Sen. Johnny Isakson, a Republican from the Atlanta suburbs, announces his intention to file his own bill, it's an indication of the heat politicians across the South are feeling to do something about the nation's porous borders and its estimated 10 million-plus illegal immigrants.

Reflecting the sentiments of voters he said are increasingly impatient over the issue, Isakson wants to substantially increase enforcement on the Mexican border and eliminate incentives for U.S. farms and businesses to hire illegal immigrants.

"The first real speech I made in the Senate was on the immigration issue, and I basically said that after Iraq, the No. 1 issue in Georgia is immigration," he said.

"It's a public policy issue that is reaching critical mass," said Michael Ciamarra, vice president of the Alabama Policy Institute, a conservative think tank. "Every single talk show in Birmingham and this part of the state is consumed with it."

Immigration issues used to be described as a purely federal concern, but as pressure at the local level has increased, state legislatures are taking up bills like the one proposed by Rep. Chip Rogers (R-Woodstock), which would bar illegal immigrants from enrolling in Georgia colleges and universities.

Even at the Washington level, the politics of immigration is becoming increasingly localized, as districts back home encounter unfamiliar problems.

"North Carolina has over 300,000 illegal aliens. It is incomprehensible that our state should have to rely on Atlanta for immigration decisions!" Rep. Sue Myrick (R-N.C.) wrote recently in a position paper. She thinks her state should have its own federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement office and immigration court instead of having to rely on the one based in Georgia.

Democrats are also feeling more grass-roots pressure for tougher immigration policies. After an illegal immigrant was charged in the death of a local police officer, Alabama state Rep. Randy Hinshaw (D-Huntsville) drafted a bill that, like Rogers' in Georgia, would limit the state services available to illegal immigrants. Hinshaw said the bill doesn't go as far as a get-tough initiative approved by Arizona voters last year.

"We try to take ... a compassionate approach to it," Hinshaw said.

Immigration presents a "quandary" to both parties, which don't want to "alienate a growing constituency," Isakson said.

But because they hold power in Washington, it is the Republicans who currently feel that quandary most sharply.

"I've done polling for 40 years and my impression is this moves voters as much as anything I've ever seen, so I think the party which gets out in front of it will have an advantage," said Jack Hawke, a former North Carolina state Republican chairman who now heads the Civitas Institute, a conservative think tank.

But just how far to go is the question.

"I think you can go overboard. People want something done, but I also think you've got to be careful," Hawke said.

The debate in Washington has centered on how to create a system for immigrant workers to obtain legal permission to enter the country under regulated conditions, an idea President Bush raised early in his first term.

The bill Isakson contemplates, like one introduced by Republican senators Kyl of Arizona and John Cornyn of Texas, would require immigrants currently in the United States illegally to go back to their home countries before applying for legal work permits. McCain's bill, introduced with Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), would allow illegal immigrants to remain in the country while becoming guest workers.

But grass-roots pressure generated by groups such as the Federation for American Immigration Reform, or FAIR, which favors tougher immigration policies, has led to a call for guarantees of tougher enforcement before any long-range solutions are put on the table.

"Enforcement of immigration laws, current and new, should come first to satisfy the increasing public demand for border security. It will not be enough to pass enforcement bills this fall that will take a year or two to produce results," Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) wrote in a letter to White House strategist Karl Rove in September.

Although some conservatives have dismissed it as lip service, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has taken a tougher line on enforcement, promising a "no exceptions" policy on returning illegal immigrants apprehended in this country, in testimony last month before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

"People have a real feeling that if the borders aren't secure, then we as a nation aren't secure. It's that basic," said Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.).

Still, it may be too early to tell whether the immigration issue will be a major part of the debate in the 2006 political campaigns. Although Hawke said his polling showed intense concern about immigration among North Carolina voters of both parties, Republican pollster Ed Goeas said only 3 percent of voters rated immigration as their top issue in the nationwide Battleground Poll he conducts with Democratic pollster Celinda Lake.

Republican Jerry Kilgore's efforts to make illegal immigration an issue in the Virginia governor's race proved unsuccessful this week when he was defeated by Democrat Timothy Kaine.

But there is also no doubt that interest is intense in areas like metro Atlanta, the epicenter of an immigrant growth rate that is among the nation's fastest. Explaining how the issue rises at the grass roots, several Republicans referred to what Isakson called the "dramatic visual impressions" their constituents get when visiting hospital emergency rooms and school classrooms crowded with immigrants, both illegal and illegal.

Isakson, who noted he is the grandson of a Swedish immigrant, said widespread disrespect for immigration laws has led to attitudes that are harmful to those who are in the country legally.

"The danger is we get a blurring of the lines where everybody who's a different color or speaks a difference language is assumed to be an illegal alien," Isakson said.